Discuss England teams for 2010

[LozCooper]

Incidentally, one notes that in the last 4NCL season, Maria Yurenok made a performance of 2202, whilst Sarah Hegarty (whom she beat) made a performance of 1958. With that in mind, the selection of Sarah on board five must have been a difficult decision, though I don't claim to know her other results and it is certainly true that we need to keep giving opportunities to our younger women players.

Loz,

was Maria contacted/considered?

Yes Sabrina and Maria were the two players in close contention.

[Matthew Turner]

It is hard to argue against any of the selections. I would like to see Lawrence Cooper selected as the Captain of the Mens' team.

[Carl Hibbard]

It is hard to argue against any of the selections. I would like to see Lawrence Cooper selected as the Captain of the Mens' team.

Yes of course, I was "surprised" that was not part of the annoucement

[Ljubica Lazarevic]

Loz would make a fantastic captain!

I think a lot of people don't realise the amount of time and effort he puts into organising these things. He is very fair and balanced. We should all recognise this in my opinion!

[LozCooper]

Blimey, anyone reading those last three posts will think I've hacked their accounts

I am available to be the captain but equally if any funding becomes available and there's someone who can help the GMs with their preparation then I am happy for them to be appointed. Using if and funding in the same sentence seems to be becoming a habit of mine.

[Matthew Turner]

It is my belief that Lawrence would be the best qualified person to be Captain of the Mens' team regardless of what finance was available.

[David Shepherd]

Loz would make a fantastic captain!

I think a lot of people don't realise the amount of time and effort he puts into organising these things. He is very fair and balanced. We should all recognise this in my opinion!

But looking at the positive side I think many of us do know how much time and effort he puts in and we do appreciate it. Again I think he would be the obvious choice for captain if he has time!

[Ben Purton]

I think you should be captain also, i doubt theres many better candidates.

Ben

[Jonathan Rogers]

Agreed. Loz was the most successful 4NCL captain of all, during his time. Barbican seemed to be jinxed against teams captained by him. The only strong club that we never beat was his Midland Monarchs. Indeed, even his second teams caused us problems! Midland Monarchs 2 beat Barbican 2 in the second division of 1999/2000, and Hilsmark 2 beat Barbican 2 in the second division of 2006/7 - even though Barbican 2 still finished second and first respectively at the end of those seasons.

Admittedly the skills do appear to be a bit different when captaining England. There is less choice to be made over board order, and so chess preparation, pure and simple, probably assumes a greater role. Even so, I still think that a team captained by Loz would probably do as well as it could.

[Simon Brown]

Lawrence

If Mickey isn't playing and you made funds available for him, given that his substitute presumably commanded a lower fee you should have a little change for some professional assistance, by my reckoning.

Not that I think you should use it. You should be captain. 100% support on this forum counts for something.

Being lazy - and actually not really knowing where to look - can I ask who are the selectors these days?

Simon

[Maria Yurenok]

Now that I've got an access to this forum I can reply to discussions about myself. Of course, I'm disappointed about not being selected for the England team, but that just means I have to work harder. Without knowing the real reasons behind the selections I can only guess that my currently low rating and my age were more significant than my recently great performances and my super-active tournament schedule (11 FIDE tournaments in 10 months). I have formally requested ECF to explain to me how selection works so that I can set the right targets for myself to work towards. Now in reply to Ben...

Firstly - I don't like you implying that my 4NCL result was worthless. I could not choose colours or opponents as I was restricted to the bottom board, while I didn't play the first two rounds due to another tournament in St. Petersburg.

Secondly - comparing my results from 6 months ago with Sarah's results from 1.5 years ago is nothing short of bizarre, and I would even describe it as underhand. That's because you've conveniently forgotten how you congratulated me on my great performance in Thailand only a month ago where I achieved 2261 performance against 2217 average opponents gaining me 45 rating points: http://chess-results.com/tnr32758.aspx? ... 000&snr=73

Finally - in answer to your Facebook question asking what was offensive about your post. Writing specifically about me while picking random facts to suit yourself is offensive. If you don't realise that and if you don't intend to offend - it's better not to write anything at all, especially in public. As it stands - your post is far from objective.

[LozCooper]

Hi Simon,

In theory we should have been left with some spare cash following Mickey declining his offer. However, the spare cash quickly evaporated when the organisers withdrew their offer of 2 single rooms per team which makes a big difference to the budget. This had been quoted in their initial invitation and I therefore made financial offers based on this. I can only hope they are forced to back down and honour their initial offer but chess politics being as they are I fear they won't.

As it is I am already having to contribute out of my own pocket to allow us to send the strongest available teams which explain my reluctance to agree to any four figure sums.

The selectors are Allan Beardsworth, Richard Palliser, Jonathan Parker and myself.

[Ben Purton]

Now that I've got an access to this forum I can reply to discussions about myself. Of course, I'm disappointed about not being selected for the England team, but that just means I have to work harder. Without knowing the real reasons behind the selections I can only guess that my currently low rating and my age were more significant than my recently great performances and my super-active tournament schedule (11 FIDE tournaments in 10 months). I have formally requested ECF to explain to me how selection works so that I can set the right targets for myself to work towards. Now in reply to Ben...

Firstly - I don't like you implying that my 4NCL result was worthless. I could not choose colours or opponents as I was restricted to the bottom board, while I didn't play the first two rounds due to another tournament in St. Petersburg.

Secondly - comparing my results from 6 months ago with Sarah's results from 1.5 years ago is nothing short of bizarre, and I would even describe it as underhand. That's because you've conveniently forgotten how you congratulated me on my great performance in Thailand only a month ago where I achieved 2261 performance against 2217 average opponents gaining me 45 rating points: http://chess-results.com/tnr32758.aspx? ... 000&snr=73

Finally - in answer to your Facebook question asking what was offensive about your post. Writing specifically about me while picking random facts to suit yourself is offensive. If you don't realise that and if you don't intend to offend - it's better not to write anything at all, especially in public. As it stands - your post is far from objective.

I did not call the 4NCL result worthless, the 4NCL is not the best assessment of strength. The colours situation was not specific , i was stating an example of how as a captain I could exploit the 4NCL to say qualify for the British. Its less important than your Thai result which is more consistant over a weekly period.

Secondly, i did say sarahs result when focussing on chess, she has not focussed on chess doing chemistry up until next month this year. Therefore when Jonathan Rogers mentioned he did not have all the data, this was by far her most impressive. I do not get on with Sarah very well , but she is a good player. You have indeed beaten her, but considering Johnathan was stating you compared to her regarding 4NCL, this is why I compared players.

Thirdly, both you and Sabrina did great results, Yourself at Thailand and Sabrina at Southend. Surely though the main principle is that of rating. I did indeed congratulate you on this, Thailand is not an easy place to score well in chess given the poltical stuff which occured mid tournament.

I do think my view has been blown out the water too much, i was supporting someone i still care about , the case using just 4NCL , itself is was not objective also by the previous post. I did not mean to cause offence, you are a good player, the fact you were even considered for any olympiad team tells everyone that, including myself.

Even though, this point next is a real can of worms, I really would prefer yourself or Sabrina than certain players selected on the fact you two both live here regurly. But this is something I have been heavily outspoken on in past.

The question was put why was Sarah chosen as 5 , not in a cynical way by another poster. I answered it.

Ben

[Carl Hibbard]

I do think my view has been blown out the water too much, i was supporting someone i still care about , the case using just 4NCL , itself is was not objective also by the previous post. I did not mean to cause offence, you are a good player, the fact you were even considered for any olympiad team tells everyone that, including myself.

I am "watching" to make sure your posts are impartial on this one Ben as I will accept nothing less

[andrew martin]

More serious to me is the very idea of Lawrence Cooper having to contribute out of his own pocket to aid the Olympiad cause. This is a shocking state of affairs.